Salameh denies links to CTEX and Forry Associates

Central Bank Governor Riad Salameh on Friday defended himself anew in the face of a host of accusations.

“The lawsuits targeted against me are unfounded and I have submitted audited official documents,” Salameh said in an interview with Asharq TV.

Commenting on the recent U.S. sanctions on the CTEX money exchange company and its owner Hassan Moukalled, who allegedly facilitated Hezbollah activities, Salameh noted that the company was granted a license “in line with the Lebanese laws.”

“This license came after the request was studied by central bank authorities and this company was established in the U.S. and the UAE,” Salameh added, noting that no “special relation” links him to it.

“The work of the CTEX company and the other companies is to sell dollars to the central bank and not the opposite and we emphasize that this process has nothing to do whatsoever with Hezbollah’s financing,” the governor went on to say.

“These operations are documented at the central bank and the documents prove the source of the dollars, and after the U.S. sanctions resolution was issued we suspended the company and confiscated the funds,” Salameh added.

Asked about Forry Associates Ltd -- a British Virgin Islands-registered company that lists Salameh’s brother Raja as its owner and is suspected of having brokered Lebanese treasury bonds and Eurobonds at a commission – the governor said that “no single dollar from the central bank’s money was paid to Forry.”

“I have nothing to do with this company and some took advantage of my brother’s work at the company to target me,” Salameh added, noting that “all documents are present at the judiciary.”

Salameh also noted that Lebanon’s economy grew by 2% in 2022, attributing the progress to “the initiatives that were taken by the central bank through providing liquidity to the markets.”